Falling lobster prices delight customers, worry local lobstermen

At some fish markets and grocery stores on the South Shore, you can buy a live lobster for about the same per-pound price as the chicken breast sitting in the meat coolers.

Chris Burrell

At some fish markets and grocery stores on the South Shore, you can buy a live lobster for about the same per-pound price as the chicken breast sitting in the meat coolers.

The retail price for lobster has dropped to less than $6 a pound.

That’s welcome news for lobster-loving consumers who don’t need a holiday as an excuse to put lobster on the dinner table, but hard on local lobstermen who are facing higher fuel costs and lower prices for their daily catch.

“It definitely makes it tougher,” said lobsterman Tucker Patterson, as he stood in his black rubber boots on the Scituate town pier Monday afternoon. “The price we get has gone down a dollar from last year. We’re at three and a quarter (per pound).”

Scituate lobstermen said a glut on the market is driving down prices, caused by New England lobster hauls that came about a month earlier right as Canadian lobstermen were wrapping up strong catches during their spring season.

“The lobster showed up four to six weeks early, and there were no tourists around, and it started to pile up so the price drops,” said Bill Adler, executive director of the Massachusetts Lobstermen’s Association, which has 1,300 members and is based in Scituate.

In Maine, prices have fallen even more sharply. Retailers there are selling soft-shell lobsters for as low as $4 to $5 a pound.

Most of those soft-shelled lobsters usually go to Canadian processors because they’re too fragile to ship long distances.

Patterson said he has not tried to increase his volume to cover loss from the price drop. His catch Monday was about 300 pounds, he said.

“We were doing five or six (hundred) some days,” he added.

“In today’s world, the fishermen need $4 (a pound) so they can cover their costs of operation, the fuel and bait that have gone up,” said Adler. “They need $4, and they can do okay. They got a little bit of profit.”

The lobster market is a boon for customers. Last Friday, Matt Simmons of Weymouth plunked down $20.69 for two lobsters at The Lobster Stop at the foot of the Fore River Bridge.

“That’s a pretty good price. We got lobsters dirt cheap in Newburyport last week,” he said. “That’s what made me come by here. I’ll take these to my girlfriend.”

At Mullaney’s Harborside Fish Market in Scituate, $5.99-a-pound lobster was undercut only by the mussels at $2.99 a pound.

Cheap lobster off the boat and in the markets, though, doesn’t translate into bargains in the restaurants.

Less than 50 yards from where Patterson stood on town pier, the most expensive entrée on the menu at T.K. O’Malley’s Sports Café was the lobster macaroni – $15.95.

Patterson blamed price-fixing at the top tiers of the lobster industry.

“It’s really a monopoly of big dealers that are controlling the price,” he said. “The big guys, they could give us $5 a pound and people could still buy a lobster.”

Material from the Associated Press was used in this report. Chris Burrell may be reached at cburrell@ledger.com.